Colorado Avalanche / NHL

Avalanche captain Adam Foote, 39, bucking youth fad

Captain's leadership valued as Avs embrace youngsters

Adam Foote is the only player left from the 1995-96 Stanley Cup championship team. The Avs
captain logged an average of 19-plus minutes last season. (Matt McClain, Special to The Denver Post)

On opening night, when Colorado faces the Chicago Blackhawks at the Pepsi Center, the Avalanche will honor its 1995-96 Stanley Cup championship team.

Only three players from that team won't be watching from the arena seats — winger Chris Simon and defenseman Sandis Ozolinsh, both still active in Europe's Kontinental Hockey League; and defenseman Adam Foote, who will be wearing the captain's "C" for the Avs.

"The reunion will be great, to see the guys around," Foote said Friday, on the eve of the Avalanche's grueling, seemingly interminable two-day training camp. "Maybe I should be sitting with them, I don't know, but I still feel pretty good. I wouldn't go out there if I felt I was hurting the team."

At age 39, Foote is one of the exceptions to the Avalanche's youth movement. Even on Friday, as the players went through physicals in advance of stepping on the ice at the Family Sports Center today, center Matt Duchene, 19, mentioned that watching the first Colorado Stanley Cup team was among his first memories as a 5-year-old fan. And now he plans to live with Foote, his wife, Jennifer, and their sons, Callan (12), and Nolan (10), for the second consecutive season.

You almost expect to hear this in the dressing room in a Duchene-Foote exchange: Hey, Pop, can I borrow the car keys?

"He's going to have a lot more chores this season," Foote declared. "I asked him to buy the water last year, and he only did it once. We're going to talk and make it a weekly thing."

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Duchene responded: "Oh, he's all talk. He says that now. . . . Know what? I ironed something for the first time in my life yesterday, and things are coming along. He's got to worry about not putting bones down the disposal like he did yesterday."

It's that kind of banter, of course, that remains one of the secondary lures of pro sports.

"As much as I give it to Duchene and the young guys sometimes about how young they are, and they really are, I'm probably sometimes immature for my age too," Foote said.

But the issue is: Can the captain still play? In a league that has gotten younger and faster, Foote's physical style not only has punished opponents but himself.

There also was an adjustment to make when the NHL tried to open up the game with anti-obstruction rules in the wake of the 2004-05 lockout year. The enforcement, initially zealous, has fallen off gradually, but there's still no disputing that the worst of the clutching, grabbing and mugging is history.

But after last season, when Foote logged more than 20 minutes of ice time in 32 of his 67 games, had no goals, nine assists and was a plus-8, the Avalanche quickly re-signed him to a one-year, $1.25 million contract. His leadership on a young team — and one that will be even younger than last season after the jettisoning of other veterans — was prized, but that can go only so far on the ice.

Foote said he didn't consider retiring.

"I felt pretty good at the end of the season and through the playoffs," he said. "For some reason, I watched the Olympics a lot too, and I had been fortunate enough to play in them before, and I found watching them really pumped me up for some reason. I felt pretty good in the second half, and I didn't think I was really ready to retire. I felt better last year than I did the previous two years."

Avalanche coach Joe Sacco said of Foote: "I thought that his play last year surely dictated that he has a nice presence not only off the ice, but, more important, on the ice. With Adam, you can't take away the competitiveness of this guy, and that's what's made him special over the course of his career."

Foote put a rink in his backyard late last year, and he and his three boys — Callan, Nolan and Matt — and their friends hope to get a lot of use out of it in the upcoming months.

"I think it's like living on a lake in the summer, where the kids can come over for water sports," Foote said. "The kids can play not only hockey, but lacrosse, basketball, roller-blading."

Time to sharpen skates

The Avalanche will be on the ice at Family Sports Center today and Sunday from 9 a.m.- noon. After that, it's the Burgundy-White game Monday at the FirstBank Center in Broomfield and the exhibition opener Tuesday night at St. Louis. The Avs play Los Angeles at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the Pepsi Center.

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